CIVIL ASSISTANCE MAY END TOO

By ELIZABETH GLEICK

During her 23-year marriage, Margaret Randolph could have qualified as a poster woman for spousal abuse. Her husband Gary Randolph, a sometime dock worker, would get drunk and then "bring out his guns," Margaret says. He would shoot up the house as their three children, now ages 22, 15 and 13, dived for cover under the beds. According to Margaret, one night Gary shot her in the arm with a pistol. Afraid to report the incident to the police, she packed up the children a few months later and moved from their St. Louis home to Chatsworth, Georgia. But Gary hired a detective who found her there, then hired a lawyer to wage a custody battle. Randolph had no money for a lawyer, so at her sister's advice she called a Legal Services office. Judy Freiberg, who has a great deal of experience in domestic abuse and custody disputes, took the case. At the trial last fall, according to Freiberg, after the judge heard testimony including statements from the children, he urged the parties to settle. Under the terms of the settlement, Gary may exercise his visiting rights only by picking up and dropping off the kids at the police station. Margaret, 41, now has a permanent restraining order, as well as her first full-time job, at a yarn factory, and hopes to save the $350 she needs to change her name. "More than most people, these women need a strong advocate," says Freiberg. "All they need is a little help and legal protection."

The Legal Services Corporation is the civil side of indigent legal assistance. It is the lawyer of last resort for poor people with family, housing, consumer or entitlement problems. But it has long been a target of conservatives. Senator Phil Gramm has called for LSC's possible abolition, although he may be backing down on that demand. House Budget chairman John Kasich has proposed deep cuts in LSC funding and aims to phase it out altogether. Traditionally, the right has taken issue with LSC's history of filing class actions against the government on behalf of the poor over welfare benefits, food stamps, and the like. But Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed told the New York Times earlier this year that the corporation should be abolished because it "subsidizes divorce and illegitimacy" by providing legal representation in domestic disputes.

For the most part, however, the LSC has enjoyed bipartisan support since it was created by Congress with President Nixon's backing, in 1974. A private, nonprofit corporation, it administers grants to 323 programs with 12,000 neighborhood law offices in every county in the U.S. In addition, more than 130,000 lawyers are involved in pro bono activities directed by the LSC. But even with the $415 million that Congress currently appropriates -- which is augmented by $240 million from,state and other sources -- a recent American Bar Association survey found that less than one-fifth of the civil legal needs of the poor are being met; the LSC says it has to turn away 43% of eligible clients. The resulting triage means the LSC now rejects divorce cases except when spousal abuse is involved and eviction cases unless a family risks homelessness.

Now the LSC budget, like other federal programs of its kind, is in for some heavy cuts -- perhaps 35% -- and it may also be barred from filing class action. But the LSC insists that those account for less than one-tenth of 1% of its caseload -- 1,600 out of 1.7 million cases in 1994. "People don't understand what we do," says Freiberg. "If they answered the phone and heard our clients and the kinds of stories we hear, people wouldn't be so anti-Legal Services."

--Reported by David Seideman/New York

With reporting by David Seideman/New York